


The Burly Wood

by karrenia_rune



Category: Alice In Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
Genre: Community: 50scenes, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-15
Updated: 2011-05-15
Packaged: 2017-10-19 10:06:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/199672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karrenia_rune/pseuds/karrenia_rune
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Another look at the boy from the Jabberwocky poem, and what his life and family might have been like and how it would affect all of those around him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Burly Wood

Title: The Burly Wood  
Fandom: Alice in Wonderland, general series  
Author: karen (karrenia)  
Character: 'the beamish boy' whom I believe was never actually  
given a name from the boy "the Jabberwocky."  
Rating: general audiences  
Prompt: #07 moonlight  
Table: 1  
word count: 563

 

9/50

Disclaimer: Alice and Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass  
books are the original creations of Lewis Carroll as is the poem  
"The Jabberwocky"; they are not mine. They belong to whomever owns his  
estate now.

 

"The Burly Wood" by Karen

Waiting is always the hardest part, that and not the long stretches of time imagining the various disasters that could have befallen their only son.

Yet they would wait, wait as long as it took for their boy to return from his grand quest.

Of course, worry was always there to plant the seeds of doubt.

However they could not help thinking that they had a right to stop the young man.

He had seen so clearly what needed to be done, and come hail or shine he was the one to do it.

Not without a tear or two, on both the parents and the youth's part their only son had gone whistling down the lane and into the forest.

Sometimes as they lay awake in their bed, the young man's parents huddled close and whispered aloud if their fear was more of the monster that lurked in those woods, or fear of losing their boy at the hands of said monster.

 

The moonlight silvered the branches of the trees was quite, well, beautiful. It does more than just illuminate his path under his feet and enabled him to see all around within a good furlong or two in any given direction.

"Things are so much sharper and smoothly defined at night than they are by day," said the lad as he stood with his back against a sharp outcropping of stone that thrust up out of the ground with his hands resting upon his knees, taking a moment to consider his next move.

This deep in the forest there were no paths, one direction looked as good as the next, the air was still and a trifle hard to breath which forced him to take deep, slow breaths but he had come prepared for that, and while he rested, walked, and rested, had taken time to take several healthy swallows from his water canteen slung on the belt around his waist.

Whistling a half-remembered tune under his breath the boy pushed himself away from the stone outcropping ignoring the moss, dirt and brambles that clung to his leggings, breeches, and tunic.

Judging by the equally green and furry moss that clung like a second growth to the bark of the pine, yew, and oak trees, indicated that he was heading north, he got moving once more.

Out of the corner of his eye he caught a momentary glimpse of a silvery darting shadow of a squirrel scrambling up the bark of a oak tree on the track of a cache of nuts, most likely. A few moments later he both saw and heard and owl as it streaked across the night sky far above his head.

They were not what he sought, and he put it out of his mind.

While he was well aware of the cautionary tales he had heard from the village elders, from his folks of the even grander and more dangerous creature whose haunt these woods were rumored to be; he was not afraid.

"At best, the creature is nothing more than a legend, and I will return home to the jeers and laughter of the others; at worst, the creature is  
real..." he trailed off allowing for a momentary shiver of fright to travel up and down his spine. "Either way, I must see this task through to the end, bitter as it may be."


	2. The Vorpal Blade

Title: The Vorpal Blade  
Fandom: Alice in Wonderland, general book series  
Author: karrenia  
Rating: General Audiences  
Characters: the main character from the Jabberwocky poem, now as an adult relating  
to his five year old son about his adventures.  
Prompt: #48 pluto Table 1  
Disclaimer: The Wonderland universe and its characters are the original creations of Lewis Caroll or whomever owns his estate now; they are not mine and are only 'borrowed' for the purpose of the story; they are not mine.

 

"The Vorpal Blade" by Karen

 

I remember it like it was yesterday instead of almost well, let's just say a long time ago. After all the passage of time to a five year old elapses in the blink of an eye. My son comes running in from the front lawn where he has been occupied in chasing a butterfly whose wings are jeweled puzzle; an assortment of random bits of purple, green, and blue. Clutched tightly in his small fist in bouquet of dandelions he plans to give to his mother. I take them and promise to lay them aside until we go back inside the house and present them to her.

With a smile I sit down on the front stoop with my son beside him and tell him I wish to tell him a story. He eagerly nods and squirms around some in order to find a more comfortable position. I begin with the classic opening: Once upon a time.

After all this time the brilliant sheen of these events have faded some as is only natural but the ache in my knee where I was grazed by the Jabberwocky's teeth come a change in the seasons from spring to autumn which in turn obliges one to have recourse to walk about with my ivory-handled cane is a tangible reminder of the time in my youth.

I proceed to tell my son of as a youth recently come of manly years I had heard legends of the fearsome Jabberwock who dwelt in the dark and fearsome tulgy woods.

I related to my boy how I had felt such a compelling and overwhelming stirring in my breast that I had been destined to confront and slay said beast and with the legendary vorpal blade that had come down to our family through untold generations; as I had believed at the time; but I have since learned otherwise, I argued and plied my case until nothing would do but that I venture out on this quest come hell or high water.

The actual acquiring of that blade is another story, but I digress. To continue, I set out armed with the sword, a satchel packed full of provisions and a spring in my step on a bright spring morning much like this one.

"Did you find the Jabberwock, Papa?" my son asked.

"By and by," I replied. "I want you to know about this. I say this not to sound as if well self-important,: I shrugged. "I suppose that at five years old when you hear the local legends and tales related around the hearth you think that adventures beginnings, middles and ends proceed in a straight unbroken line."

He nods eagerly and I continue with my tale.

"There were many distractions along the way. My heart was light in order to travel the faster; and the sunlight itself almost too bright, the colors too intense, but by and by I located those tulgy woods and using the blade to hack and slash my way through many an obstruction I found the Jabberwock."

"What happened next, Papa?"

The father paused and stole a glance down at the face of his son before he replied. "I found myself regarded in a most disconcerting and uncanny manner. The creature could not speak as you and I are now doing but there was a certain low cunning in its gaze, an intelligence far beyond those of the ordinary beasts of the field and the air. I have never before felt its like nor I will I ever again, I suspect."

He sighed and paused, searching his memories for what followed after that mutual engage of assessment. "At first the creature ignored me but full of my purpose and I must admit knowledge of what failure would cost in the eyes of my family and villagers I persisted. If I had had any second thoughts about the wisdom or even more accurately the folly of this venture, well, my son," the father shrugged. "I was too far in to turn back now."

His son nodded and tugged on his sleeve eager to hea the remainder of the story. "In hindsight the jabberwock although its eyes were like twin burning embers and its claws were sharp. I suspect it was much smaller than its legend would have it. In fact it was nought than the size of small horse."

"That's still very big, Papa," my son observed.

"Indeed. In the first it had enough strength at its disposal to knock me off my feet and sent tumbling head over heels a good distance where I fetched up against the bole of walnut tree. I watched it trundle away easy as you please. I got up after a few minutes and dusted myself as best I could and went after it, promising that I would make a much better account of myself, or die trying. Oh, it sounds very good in stories but those who make such a claim never take into account those for whom such a declaration would affect should that latter and not the former prove to be the case."

For the Jabberwock I would have made hardly a decent mouthful, skinny as switch as a lad that I was the. However, I tramped around that forest for almost two days before I stumbled upon its tracks once more.

It seemed annoyed to see me, perhaps it had given no more regard to me other than as a two-legged intruder that it had now been well rid of. The suddenness of its launch from recumbent on the ground to springing through the air took me by surprise, but the spring took it just short of where I scrambled away. I stood ready on its second lunge, the sound of the metal of my sword making contact with its sharp teeth and claws. Again its sheer size and weight knocked me aside.

"Did you slay it, Papa!"

I reached down and cupped the small face in my work-callused hands and finding myself in this maudlin and frank mood felt compelled to tell my boy the truth; after all, did he not deserve to know the truth? As I mentally processed that very question I said aloud: "No."

"The legends will say that I did; it makes for a better story."

"The legends got it wrong?"

"Not wrong, it's just that legends by their very nature are well,..." I trailed off as I searched for an appropriate phrase before adding, "Allowed to embellish a little or a lot, as the case may be."

"Thank you for the story, Papa."

"You are quite welcome, my beamish boy!" I replied suddenly recalling a familiar and rather quaint phrase from one of the legends of my exploits of so long ago. I tried it on for size and realized that I liked it. "Come on, let us go back inside the house I believe that then will give your mother her bouquet of flowers and then she will have supper ready for us."

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